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Saturday, June 23, 2012

Thinking outside of the box can be a tricky task, but it is
necessary if one hopes to come up with a story that hasn’t already been thought
of or isn’t something that could just as easily be dreamt up by anybody. The
natural habit of falling into a comfort zone can easily hamper one’s ability to
innovate. In the context of genre film, it is easy to stay inside the comfort zone
while exploring around a little outside of the box, not too far, though, to
discover something pretty new and cool that keeps the genre alive for that much
longer. With Antonio Margheriti’s THE
VIRGIN OF NUREMBERG we have all of the ‘60s Gothic horror themes we know and
love that keep us happy and comfortable but melds and fuses them with
fascinating new approaches that keeps one from getting bored of the same ol’,
same ol’.

A young nobleman moves into his ancestral castle with his wife. After
the wife notices her husband missing one night, she strolls out of bed and seemingly
witnesses the aftermath of a servant being tortured and murdered in the castle’s
museum of medieval torture devices. The person responsible is a ghostly killer
whose identity is hinted at by a servant that refers to him as “The Punisher,”
claiming that he’s come back “to plant the seed of terror in shameless women’s
hearts.” Is the killer her husband, one of the strange servants, or something
else that has culminated from past evils?

A cool little charm to Margheriti’s film is that despite a few
reminders of the modern (1960s Germany) setting, the majority of time spent in
and around an ancient castle frequently fooled me into thinking that this was
an era piece. I liked that there were plenty of candles with antique holders on
hand for when the mandatory thunderstorms would cause the power to go out,
giving us a nice reason to view our gorgeous heroine, Mary (Rossana Podestà of SEVEN GOLDEN MEN), wander
the dark castle halls with lit candles in hand.

Monday, June 4, 2012

What decides when to move forward with experimentation
that may be considered unethical or taboo but could better humanity? Debates on the ethics and consequences of the research are usually
conducted. But what of the consequences of the idea being turned down? One possible
answer to this is provided in Jess Franco’s
SHE KILLED IN ECSTASY, where a physician, who believes his experiments hold the key to making humanity far more resistant to disease, is
condemned, on moral grounds, by his colleagues, insulted and has to endure his
precious documents being ripped and thrown aside.

With JessFranco, I don’t necessarily think it's a simple matter of
taste but more a matter of acquired taste. I mentioned a while back in my write-up for
A VIRGIN AMONG THE LIVING DEAD that I wasn’t too impressed with Franco at first. In fact, I started
watching his movies just to see if they are as bad as some people say they are.
But the impulse to continue to explore his works stayed with me, and I’m glad I
didn’t lose interest, otherwise, I really would’ve missed out on some gems, like
this one.

A married couple lives a blissfully happy existence
together, until the husband’s controversial research on human embryos results
in him being expelled from his occupation by the medical association. He is
driven to suicide, and his wife swears revenge on those she believes to be
responsible.

This story contains no real surprises, and it ends up
being easy to see where everything is going, and so, it instead becomes more
important that we at least enjoy our time in the world that the film creates
for us and the company of its lead character. The pleasant
company in SHE KILLED IN ECSTASY is Soledad
Miranda, who I’d like to describe as being like a fragile doll with
enticingly dark features and doughy eyes that stare seductively. In a room full
of people, she stands out like a beautiful black rose in a garden of weeds.